Goodwood Festival of Speed takes off

July 11, 2008 New and old, two wheels and four, supercars, concepts, rally and F1 legends plus everything in between, Britain's premier celebration of all things motorsport - the Goodwood Festival of Speed - got underway today to the delight of thousands of petrol-heads from all around the globe.

The key attraction of the Festival is that not only can you get up close and personal with a vast array of automotive masterpieces (around 350 feature at this years event), but you can also see, smell and hear many of them in action with some of the world's best drivers at the wheel as they take on the famous Goodwood 1.16 mile hill climb.

The theme of this years event "Hawthorn to Hamilton - Britain's love affair with world motorsport", draws a link between world 1958 GP champion Mike Hawthorn and his modern day counterpart Lewis Hamilton, who will appear at the Goodwood Circuit on Sunday.

Among the key attractions at this years event are a long list of supercars including the Ferrari 430 Scuderia, the KTM X-bow,Bugatti Veyron (which still manages to draw the biggest crowd), the Caparo T1, the Audi R8, the Nissan GTR and the high performance Tesla roadster EV. A selection of cars made famous by the James Bond film franchise (complete with Bond girls) also grabbed the spotlight and for budding auto-nuts, the cars from the famous Wacky Racers cartoon have also been brought to life for this years event.

See the gallery for some of the highlights and check for updates as the festival continues over the next two days.

After a misspent youth at law school, Noel began to dabble in tech research, writing and things with wheels that go fast. This bus dropped him at the door of a freshly sprouted Gizmag.com in 2002. He has been Gizmag's Editor-in-Chief since 2007. All articles by Noel McKeegan